In the semiconductor device manufacturing process, it is required to polish a polishing object poor in chemical reactivity such as a metal carbide, a metal nitride or a composite material of these at a high speed.
Many of the polishing compositions that have been used for polishing the above polishing object in the related art contain abrasive grains and an acid.
For example, in JP 2010-41037 A (U.S. Pat. No. 8,419,970), a polishing composition which contains silica and an organic acid having a sulfonic acid group or a phosphonic acid group and has a pH of from 2.5 to 5 is disclosed.